Horse racing in Ayr can be traced back to 1576 but the first properly organised meeting, a two day affair, was held in 1771 with the first Ayr Gold Cup run in 1804.

The Western Meeting Club was formed in 1824 and the same year the Western Meeting, now the William Hill (Ayr) Gold Cup Festival, was established.

By 1838 the Western Meeting had grown and boasted £2000 in prize money with the race for two year olds at the fixture the most valuable race of the season in Britain.

The next milestone in the development of the Western Meeting came in 1855 when the Ayr Gold Cup became a handicap - today it is the richest sprint handicap in Europe and in 2014 the prize money for the race alone is £155,000.